BUTTERFLY FLOWER: Please Wait To Be Seated.

Premiering at the 2017 Kampot Readers & Writers Festival (Cambodia) on the 3rd November 2017, and due for release on Asian American streaming platform Chopso (November 3rd), BUTTERFLY FLOWER is a film which shouldn’t exist. This miracle was co-directed and stars my now ex-wife Lisac Pham right before our messy separation and more recent divorce. Knowing this before seeing the film, know that this was our last love letter to cinema.

Set in Australia, the film has a very thin plot. The film starts on Valentine’s Day 2012 (the end of the world), as we follow Pisces a young prostitute from Vietnam who is now residing in Melbourne. Tied together by the poetry of Filipino artist and filmmaker Khavn, for the next 71 minutes we watch Pisces life after she has bloomed into a Madame.

Lisac and I made two films together, Down Under and BUTTERFLY FLOWER, which are companion pieces. These films examine both sides of the coin, like East meets West. With Australia becoming more and more Asian from migration every year, the lack of Asian stories to come from Australia sometimes surprises me. It’s not only the lack of stories, but the types of stories. BUTTERFLY FLOWER uses Melbourne’s CBD as a canvas for loneliness, offering what I feel is a fresh view on the Asian influence on urban Australia. The film offers this perspective because it was made hand in hand with Lisac, who at the time was an international student. There is an unending melancholy in every single frame of this film, because it represents the waiting room for Asians who may live in Australia and feel like it’s already their home, but are in transit waiting for their outcome.

Our film is a fresh Asian-Australian film exploring untouched topics about the ever-evolving identity of the land Down Under. It’s the ‘final film from Matthew Victor Pastor & Lisac Pham.’ Enjoy. BUTTERFLY FLOWER can be seen at the Kamot Writers & Readers Festival on November 3rd. It will also be available online on Chopso.